


quarantine [redux]

by aprhrodite



Category: Hardy Boys - Franklin W. Dixon, Nancy Drew (Video Games), Nancy Drew - Carolyn Keene, Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys Super Mysteries - Franklin W. Dixon & Carolyn Keene
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-27
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-13 07:08:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29024754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aprhrodite/pseuds/aprhrodite
Summary: frank has to find joe before it’s too late –– the problem is, he has no idea where they’ve taken him or the dangers that await him outside.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 10





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [quarantine](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11321784) by [aprhrodite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aprhrodite/pseuds/aprhrodite). 



> this is a long-awaited redux of my original fanfic i started back in 2017. my writing has grown since then, and i wanted to revisit this fanfiction and give it the ending it deserved. the original draft is still on my page. 
> 
> please note there are NO original characters in this work –– all characters are from the 1-32 original nancy drew games, but they don't know each other (e.g., nancy doesn't know all the characters she meets in the games). this was so i could have fun with the characters and their personalities in a way that still held true to the fandom.

Frank Hardy had never been closer to death as he was right now, crouched low behind a broken bookshelf. He had never been the skittish type, but he’d always known to listen to his natural fight or flight instincts, and today he’d been right. His heart pounded deep in his chest. Once certain the coast was clear, he shifted his weight to his heels and peeked around the corner, keeping most of his wide frame concealed behind the bookshelf.

The problem wasn’t that he could see anything—he could _hear_ something scurrying around to his left. Sweat collected on his brow and the back of his neck. He had to make the right move here; losing cover could easily mean losing his life if he wasn’t careful. Slowly, avoiding the broken glass bottles to his immediate right, he came down to his knees in a crawling position and began to move forward. He scoured the ground in front of him for any sign of glass, tin, metal—anything that would make a sound underneath him.

Frank swallowed hard and left the refuge of the bookshelf, keeping himself close to other overturned pieces of furniture. He had no plan of escape—only to keep moving, slowly, until he was sure of his next move. The other presence was also moving, softly moaning in the corner. He had given himself a birth from the thing, whatever it was.

He was nearly behind an old counter—it was probably once a cash register, he mused—when he heard it: a low, yet feminine voice to his left.

“Over here,” the voice said. Frank jerked his head to see the source of the noise but came up empty. There was only a door to a conjoining room.

A split-second thought told him to go toward the door, but he’d have to come out of cover. He was feet away—a couple of steps and he’d be through the doorway—but he had no idea how big the Thing was or how quickly it could move. Still, the longer he stayed here the more vulnerable he was to be found on accident. He swallowed hard and concentrated on the door, left partially ajar. Beyond it, he could see a silhouette of someone.

“Hurry up,” the voice said, this time impatient.

Frank began to crawl again, following the curvature of the counter. When he was fully exposed, he glanced over his shoulder once and then quickened his pace.

The door shut behind him quietly once he was through the doorway. He heard the familiar _tick_ of the lock falling into place and he relaxed his shoulders for a moment before coming to a stand, his legs whining in discomfort. How long had he been down there? An hour?

He doesn’t think about it long. He immediately stiffens and looks behind him, preparing for the worst. People didn’t just _help_ one another mindlessly like they used to. Everyone had an agenda, and most of the time it was dictated by the fundamental duty of staying alive. Frank supposed this would be no different.

Through the flickering light, Frank could see the figure of a slender woman just barely hidden in the shadows. She took a step forward, arms raised. “No need to be like that,” she said. Frank noticed her arms, neck, and a majority of her face were peppered with scratches and scabs. Long, thin tendrils of dark hair tangled around her oval face.

Frank hardened his expression. “Thanks,” he said, all business. “Appreciate it.” He began looking around the room for another exit, keeping his eyes anywhere but on her face. The room was square and cramped. An old refrigerator remained in the corner, the top half of the freezer broken and bent atop of what was probably once a table. It looks nearly unrecognizable beneath all the rubble and bricks. Everything else in sight was covered in a thick layer of dust. Scraps of paper peppered the floor—scraps of newspapers, old magazines, journals, even some notes from the office—but the writing is illegible now with the grime and mold eating at the floor. And, to Frank’s dismay, there was no other exit, meaning he’d have to leave the way he’d came.

The woman watched him curiously before barking out something that sounded like a laugh. “In a hurry?”

Frank stopped. “I have somewhere I need to be.”

Her eyes narrowed and she set her jaw. “I see.”

His eyes settled on a familiar-looking yellow box sitting on the counter behind her.

The woman scoffed. “I didn’t save your ass only to have you steal my shit,” she said, moving the box out of her view behind her back. Frank could hear the slightest southern accent in her voice, not too apparent to be a drawl, but prominent enough to be heard. “This ain’t a corner store.”

Frank said nothing.

“You want to tell me your name? Or are we just going to go our separate ways?”

He debated, for a moment, whether or not to make something up. He had no idea who this woman was, anyway—who she ran with, what business she had outside a quarantine zone, why she happened to be here of all places—and she wasn’t exactly coming across as trustworthy. She did, however, have a 9mm clipped to the side of her ratted jeans. Frank could see the metal hidden behind a poorly constructed black holster.

As if on cue, she pulled the gun from its resting place and began carefully popping the bullets from the yellow box into the clip. “Fine, I’ll go first,” she was saying. Frank watched her fingers work. “The name is Jessalyn, if you care in the slightest, and you can spare me the formal shit and call me Jess.”

Frank looked around for something to salvage in the rubble but came up empty. He cleared his throat. “Thanks,” he said, his voice low. “For what you did.”

Jess shrugged. “There’s not many of us left nowadays. Gotta save who you can.”

“My name is Frank.”

She only nodded in response and Frank knew it was time to go. He certainly didn’t want to overstay his welcome and he had other things to attend to—more important things than making small talk. He crossed the room and peeked out of the tiny window on the upper part of the door. It was coated in some sort of sticky residue and the fractured glass made it difficult to see much of anything on the other side, but Frank was more concerned about the things he _couldn’t_ see rather than what he could see. There was no movement, no scurrying disfigured bodies, no nothing.

His hands touched the doorknob when Jess spoke again. “Here,” she said, pulling something out of the top of the busted refrigerator. Frank recognized the item immediately. It was a power bar, thick protein granola he’d used to take to the gym.

She tossed the bar to him and he wasted no time with gratitude. He pulled off the waxy coating and almost shoved the entire thing in his mouth. It had been ages since he’d eaten last and he didn’t realize how hungry and weak he’d become until he’d saw the bar in her hands. He crumpled up the wrapper and tossed it into another pile of trash. Normally, he’d be bothered by such a public display of littering, but that was neither his concern nor his problem anymore. Not when the world was crumbling around him.

Jess gave him another silent nod in approval and then he was gone, passing through the doorway just as breathlessly as he’d done the first time, sinking down on his knees just in case he wasn’t actually alone. Before the door closed behind him, she spoke again, her voice carrying through to the adjoining room.

“Best of luck out there,” she was saying. “You’ll need it.”

\---

By the time Frank made it back to his home base—a decrepit, abandoned house at the end of a cul-de-sac he’d managed to hole up in—the left side of his torso was burning. He needed to change his dressings.

He slipped inside the garage and began to work on the levers and pulleys, securing the garage door back into place. He’d found this hideout by luck after running through the thick sea of trees that followed the borderline behind the house. It had been dark and he could hardly see ten feet in front of him, but eventually, his feet hit the pavement and he could just barely make out the dark silhouette of a two-story townhome jutting out of the earth. It was risky barging into homes without at least stalking the perimeter, but Frank had been desperate for a place to sleep tonight after traveling nearly 11 hours on foot. His side had ached, but he’d hardly noticed as he flopped down on the rugged couch and passed out. By the time he’d woken up the next morning, he was miraculously unharmed, and took time to look through the rest of the place for supplies and signs of other squatters.

Now, Frank looked around the room at his available supplies. After his first night, he’d drug an old, holey mattress down from the second floor and put it in the bed of an old Ford pickup. The car was useless—that was the first thing he’d tried when he found it in the garage—but the garage proved to be the safest place for him, so this is where he slept. The door to the house was barricaded; he’d long since grabbed every usable item inside.

Once the door was secure, he bent down to collect some of his first aid supplies. Pain ripped through the side of him immediately and he stumbled back, nearly hitting his head on the wheel of the truck. He swore deep under his breath and sat down, gingerly pulling up his sweaty shirt to examine his wounds. Blood had seeped through his dressings, and he removed them quickly, trying his best not to wince as the gauze peeled off his raw skin.

The deep gash stretching from just underneath his left elbow down to his bellybutton was red and inflamed. He didn’t even bother touching it—it was already tender, and his body was starting to reject some of the poorly-done stitches. It was starting to become infected. Frank could see the ugly yellow and purple blotches spreading down the length of his torso. He should have gone to sickbay when he had the chance. He never should have let Joe get close to him with those forceps.

He discarded his old dressings in his designated trash area and fumbled with the roll of gauze, trying to keep his breathing level. He’d never been in pain like this before, not even when he fell out of the old oak tree in his backyard while playing a very serious game of hide-and-seek and broke his arm. He’d been debilitated, naturally, but the pain subsided on the way to the hospital and only returned once the doctor had made him stretch out his arm to place the cast on properly.

Now, he felt extremely lightheaded, as if any sudden movement would make him pass out. With a long sigh, he set down the roll of gauze to his right and shuffled himself toward a box he kept pushed underneath some cabinetry. He couldn’t just redress the wound. He had to clean it.

Frank searched through the box for a moment before he found what he was looking for—a long, glass bottle of vodka. It was nearly empty.

He ripped off his shirt and placed it inside his mouth like a gag and braced himself for what was about to happen. His hands shook while he removed the bottle’s cap and even more when he lowered the neck of the bottle toward himself. _It’ll be over before you know it_ , he thought. _Just bite down and don’t scream._

When the liquid hit his skin, his vision shrunk to pinpricks. He was positive he was going to pass out. He screamed into the shirt stuffed in his mouth, feeling the alcohol slither around the folds of his skin like liquid glass. Without giving himself a chance to argue with himself, he dumped the remainder of the bottle onto his wound, swearing inaudibly, his legs and arms beginning to spasm. He could feel tears forming in the corner of his eyes, his brow beading with sweat. It took everything in him not to succumb to the pain. But Frank Hardy had never been afraid of anything—or, at least, he’d always done a good job pretending to not be afraid, to be invincible, and he wasn’t going to stop the act for anyone, not even himself.

He opened his eyes and tried to slow his breathing, trying to keep his body still. Every minor jerk made the alcohol spread down his body further and irritate the other parts of his gash. He worked quickly with the gaze, placing it down vertically along his body and securing it with a couple of strips of duct tape. Once he had it properly secured, he took the shirt out of his mouth and sunk back into the skeletal body of the truck, his heart beating in his throat, eyes closed shut. There was no more moving to be done tonight. This is where he’d landed, and this is where he’d stay until morning came.

\---

When Frank woke up, he could hear them.

He leaped to his feet, cursing as his body punished him with a lightning strike of pain. He grimaced, but he didn’t have the time to care, scrambling over to the other side of the garage where he kept his weapons. All he had to his name was a few arrows and a shiv made of butter knives, a fork, and a pair of broken scissors bound together with some twine he’d found in one of the linen closets upstairs. He’d tried to sharpen it with a rock, but it only made the metal rough and jagged. Still, it was better than nothing, and he’d rather take his chances with a shiv than with nothing at all. Besides, he’d always been good at hand-to-hand combat—at least he was with the training dummies in the basement of the Network where the agents used to train.

It was still dark, the moonlight spilling in pockets in the garage. Frank pulled himself up on the bed of the truck and made his way to the top of the cab. He’d pressed the face of the truck up against the garage door mostly for protection, but this allowed him to sit and look outside the fogged windows of the garage for any sign of company. He swallowed hard, remembering the flash of fear he’d experienced just hours before, trapped behind an old bookshelf, awaiting certain death.

He heard it before he could see it—a long, hollow wailing noise that seemed to echo off the pavement outside. Then the figure stepped out into the dim light of the moon, right in front of Frank’s safe haven. It is lanky and ugly, a human depiction with arms that were too long and eyes that couldn’t see. Frank held his breath, but the figure didn’t move. It swayed in place, head down, mouth shut, as if it had gone to sleep standing up.

 _Better than awake_ , he said to himself, craning his neck to see.

He watched the creature for a while, examining its hardened body. The longer he stared at it, the more disfigured it became. Nearly every part of it was covered in deep cysts and blisters, and some had even started to sprout like bacteria on the back of its face, but the most disturbing part was its very real human eyes glossed over with white film. It was as if someone had replaced the head of a monster with a head of a human. It was male— _no, used to be male_ —judging by the short haircut and broad shoulders. It hadn’t fully transitioned yet, meaning it was a relatively new infected.

Frank was so caught up studying the composition of the first infected that he didn’t even see the second infected sprinting into view from another house. This one was screaming, but its sound was much different than the other, a high-pitched, crackling whine that carried across the neighborhood. If anyone was nearby, they’d better be running in the opposite direction.

The sprinting body collapsed into the static one, and the two infected began fighting one another on the ground before they separated and began walking around in circles, an automated track.

 _They must know they both aren’t human_ , Frank mused. _It knows not to attack its own kind_.

With a fleeting sense of danger, he quickly glanced down to his makeshift pulley system that was securing the door in place. He’d somehow rigged the door’s mechanism to a pair of 25lb weights he had found in one of the bedrooms. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to keep two scrawny infected from clawing their way inside.

Frank knew little about the infected. The most he’d learned is when he and his family had been taken to Quarantine NY and one of the officers pitied Joe enough to tell him what he knew about the creatures. While the origin was unknown, apparently a virus of sorts plagues the body and pushes the host into a series of transitions—the officer called them _phases_ —that would make it more dangerous than before. Recently turned infected would look identical to humans, except their normal mannerisms were stripped and replaced with an animalistic hunger for humans. They were fast on their feet and had the ability to see infrared light, which they used to track down living things as prey.

Beyond the preliminary stages, Frank had no idea what to expect, but he supposed the second infected was long past its first transition. Boils consumed its entire body down to its feet and mysterious reddish growths had begun to bloom on its outer shell. It looked exactly how he’d expected a zombie to look—empty, disgusting, and loud.

The two infected began to sing their horrible songs together, wailing into the night like wolves to the moon. Frank braced himself for each shriek, praying that the glass would hold despite the noise, and watched the creatures flock around one another like a weird symbolic dance. He had no idea what they were doing, and he didn’t care. As long as the door held against them, they could do whatever they wanted. He hoped they’d leave soon.

After ten minutes, the creatures started to wander away from Frank’s home into the bleak night. Their screeches melted into mere choking sounds, a cough in the distance, and Frank could see them running into one another as they made their exit. He was just about to hop off the truck and get a couple more hours of sleep when he heard another noise—this one soft, desperate, pleading. Human.

He twisted himself back around again, careful to move slowly around his wound, and pressed his face up against the glass again. Amid the croaking and wailing in the distance, he can barely make out another figure crouched down behind the neighboring house. After a moment, the figure steps into the moonlight, keeping itself hidden from the two creatures sauntering down the road. It’s a young girl. She looked like couldn’t be any older than fifteen with her large cherubic cheeks and bony frame.

Frank craned his neck even farther this time to watch the girl, ignoring the seething pain creeping over his torso with every awkward turn of his chest. The girl was equally careful with her movements, deliberate, taking time to inch forward slowly. She hadn’t noticed Frank’s peering eyes from above and was steadily fixed on crossing the road to get into the cover of another boarded-up home to Frank’s right. She took her time, every so often glancing over her shoulder to make sure the two infected were preoccupied with the sounds of their own noises instead of her treacherous escape.

Frank watched as she made her way across the pavement, sweat dripping down the back of her neck. He should offer to help, but moving the garage door meant noise, and noise meant the infected would hear and come crawling back to devour them both. If Joe had been here, as he should have been, the two of them would have probably been able to fight the two of them off, but Frank was wounded and alone, so he decided it was best to watch the girl go at it alone.

She was nearly to the sidewalk when her ankle gave and sent her slamming into a rusted mailbox. The sound of crashing metal reverberated in the night air. The distant wailing had stopped.

Frank grew still, his breath hitching in his throat. The girl was up on her feet in seconds, scrambling to make purchase in the dead grass. Frank looked around desperately, trying to find anything he could to help her, but he had little to work with, and if the infected hadn’t heard her fall, he didn’t want to risk making it worse.

He squinted, trying to see the infected appear again on the horizon, but they didn’t come. Had they been far enough away that they didn’t hear her? Or had their impeccable hearing been exaggerated, a ghost story used to scare teenagers around a campfire? Frank didn’t know. He watched on as the girl made it to the side of the other house, gripping the siding for dear life. She looked exhausted, but Frank knew that she had to keep going. As if on cue, she gathered herself and began to inch alongside the exterior until she made it to the back porch. Her shoulders heaved forward in what looked like a heavy sigh and she took off in a sprint, long legs carrying her into the backyard toward another neighborhood that looked identical to the one Frank was in now.

He felt himself sigh in relief as she ran away and brought his index and thumb to his nose, rubbing his eyes and then his temples. He had no idea how long he’d been asleep, but it obviously hadn’t been enough for him to rid the fatigue that plagued his muscles. He was stiff and uncomfortable and wanted nothing more than to lie down in the truck for another couple of hours, at least until daylight. Whenever that was.

A scream ripped through the air.

Frank was on his feet again in seconds, nearly falling into the door in front of him with the full weight of his body. He pulled himself upright and watched as the two infected—t _he same ones from earlier or were there more?_ —came screeching out of the back patio of the house tucked behind the home the girl had run from. Frank could barely make out her jeans in the muddy brush. She was knocked onto the ground, scrambling again to put distance between her and the snarling figures, but they were quickly approaching, and she was slipping in the dirt.

The older infected, the one with the ugly boils, dropped down to all fours and began running like an animal through the backyard. The screaming was almost unbearable, but Frank could not tear his gaze from the scene in front of him. He watched as they reached her, practically foaming at the mouth, all limbs flailing. The girl pulled something out of her back pocket, a silver shard that caught the reflection of the moonlight, and then was tackled to the ground. She fought against the new infected, using her long legs to keep its hungry mouth at bay, swinging her little pocketknife when it came too close to her face. She looked as if she was fending it off until the other infected reached the two of them wrestling in the dirt and latched on to her leg, pulling her out from underneath the other.

They squirmed for a while, the girl fighting for her life and the infected unrelenting, ravenous, hungry. Without another thought, Frank leapt off the top of the truck and began undoing his pulley work, his hands burned raw from the friction of the rope underneath his palms. He could still hear the infected outside, the girl screaming in protest, but he didn’t stop until the weights dropped to the ground again, this time untied, and swung the garage door open with all his might.

The infected were too busy working at the girl that they hardly noticed Frank appearing out of the darkness. He gripped the shiv tight in his right hand and began to run toward her, adrenaline pumping through his veins, sweat pouring off his forehead. He was on autopilot. All of his common sense about his own safety had dissipated almost as quickly as the morning dew. He wasn’t Frank Hardy in that moment anymore, he was Special Agent Hardy of the Network, formally known as ATAC, sworn to serve and protect, sworn to save and safeguard those in need.

He made it to the side of the house when the older infected pinned her left hand down, the one holding the pocketknife, and sunk its teeth deep into her neck, ravaging around like a predator versus prey, tearing open her soft skin.

Frank watched the next series of events in slow motion. He fell to his knees, from exhaustion or defeat he didn’t know, and heard the girl’s choked screams become watery and unfamiliar. Her arms and legs began to squirm under the weight of both infected as they continued to mark her body with more and more marks, big gaps of missing flesh in her thighs, torso, upper arms. Frank tried with all his might to stand, but the scene in front of him made his vision hazy, mere pinpricks, and he wobbled back on his heels and fell to a seat once again.

Gunshot ripped through the air suddenly, bringing Frank back to the girl and the infected. Both ravaging bodies atop of the girl stopped their squirming and blew back from the impact, some of their limbs exploding into a pool of blood. The entire backyard looked like a massacre. The air was thick with the smell of metal and smoke and the infected looked like roadkill, their bodies awkwardly contorted in their final resting places. The girl remained on her back, twitching and convulsing, dark crimson pouring from her mouth. She tried to sit up once, propping herself up on her elbow long enough for Frank to see her face devoid of color, eyes blotchy, neck painted in crimson. She stayed upright long enough to vomit and then fell back down again.

Frank pulled himself up to standing, his knees weak and shaky. He glanced around frantically for the source of the gunfire, but the entire street was dark and empty save for the girl in front of him. He could hardly look at her anymore. He turned and put his hand on the side of the wall trying to keep himself upright, feeling his stomach muscles contract. If he had anything more to eat than the power bar from Jess, he’d be throwing up instead of dry heaving.

After a moment trying to drown out the sound of the girl choking on her own blood, Frank could hear footsteps approaching across the dry grass. He braced for another fight, feeling the tension rise in his upper shoulders again, but when he turned to look, he only saw three normal-looking individuals making their way across the field toward the girl. The first, steadily in front of the others, was an older man with an unkempt beard and a face masked by the brim of a white cowboy hat. He was gripping the barrel of a sawed-off shotgun. Behind him, he was joined by a severe-looking woman with dark eyes and a younger guy with a square jaw dusted with a five o’clock shadow.

The three of them paid no attention to Frank and instead gathered around the girl’s convulsing body. They talked amongst themselves for a moment before the older man adjusted his shotgun in his grip and pointed it at the girl’s forehead. Her hand flew out and gripped the barrel, coughing, body squirming, until her hand fell free and she began to foam at the mouth. The older man cocked his gun and the other two took two precautionary steps back from the body. 

Frank could feel himself running toward them on autopilot. He stopped abruptly a few feet away from the girl when the woman pulled out a pistol and positioned the barrel right between his eyes. The older man hesitated, lowered the gun, and then swiveled around on his thick-heeled boots to face Frank. He studied Frank’s face for a moment, working a toothpick around yellowed teeth.

Frank took a hesitant step back and the woman flipped the safety off her gun in warning. “Don’t move,” she said. Her bottom lip curled. “Or it’ll be the last thing you do.”

She kept the gun positioned in place as Frank turned his gaze to the older man. “You can’t shoot her,” he said, his words quivering. He hated how small he sounded. The older man waved the woman off and she retreated back to his flank with the other guy. Frank took another opportunity and raised both hands up slowly by his face. “Please. You—you can’t.”

The man pushed the barrel of the gun into Frank’s stomach, flipping his toothpick from one side of his mouth to another. Frank tensed from the sensation, feeling the warm metal against his shirt. The man barked out something that sounds like a laugh. “Y’got another suggestion, boy?” he said. 

Frank blinked hard, trying to wipe everything from his vision.

The woman from earlier was back again, suddenly, though this time she came without a weapon. “We can’t shoot her, huh? You want to just leave her here like this?” She pointed down to the girl’s body. “You want to wait until she becomes one of those—one of those _things_?” She nearly spat out the word, motioning with her chin to the heap of bone and blood lying lifeless next to where they were standing.

The barrel of the shotgun came off Frank’s stomach long enough to come up toward his left cheek. The metal kissed his skin. “It’s for her own good, son,” said the old man, but Frank didn’t feel comforted like he was supposed to. There was nothing comforting about him—not the old bloodstains behind the folds of his jacket or the wrinkles etched into his calloused skin. Everything about him felt like a trap. “Let her die with some goddamn dignity.”

Frank said nothing, setting his jaw as the old man removed the gun from his sight and pointed it at the girl again. Whatever the girl was now was worse than a shotgun blast to the forehead, a quick and painless death for a suffering soul. He braced himself for the sound as the man cocked the gun into place once more.

The sound of gunshot echoed through the quiet street once more and the girl’s body went limp. Her face was suddenly unrecognizable from the blast and Frank tore his gaze away from her and started to walk back toward his fort, feeling pale with nausea. His eyes felt heavy and his body was exhausted, and he had nothing left to say to the murderous lot.

“Going somewhere?” the woman called out behind him, but Frank didn’t turn around. He kept his gaze focused on the garage, one foot in front of the other, telling himself that if he stopped for even a moment, he might not ever start again.

Behind him, the group talked openly, either indifferent or unaware of the fact that Frank was listening. “Forget it,” the young guy was saying. “He’s not bothering anyone. Just let him go back to wherever it is he came from.”

“No,” the woman said almost immediately. “He’s strong. He can work in the Trench.”

 _One foot in front of the other_ , Frank thought as his feet hit the pavement.

“I don’t really think we should—”

“Since when I have ever given a damn about what you think, Nick?”

A pair of hands landed on Frank’s shoulders, pulling him back around to face the trio. “You’re coming with us,” the old guy said. “C’mon.”

Frank’s body hardened. “You’re not taking me anywhere.”

The woman guffawed and glanced down at Frank’s shiv which had cut a small incision into Frank’s palm from his tight grip. “And what are you going to do about it, tiger? Stab me to death?”

The younger guy—Nick—shook his head. “Just do what they say, man. I don’t think you have a choice in the matter.”

For a split second, Frank tried to calculate his odds of surviving a fight with three fully armed individuals with only a rough-and-ready shiv at his aid. He’d taken down plenty of people while on jobs for the Network, but he’d always had Joe as a backup, and the two of them rarely went anywhere without one another when they were working. He exhaled in frustration. He couldn’t take out a squad of this size, especially defenseless, but he couldn’t afford to be taken to the Trench—whatever and wherever _that_ was—and waste even more time when he should be tracking down the bastards that took his brother.

The older man rubbed his beard. “We gonna do this the hard way or the easy way?”

“Are those my only choices?” asked Frank.

“Unfortunately,” the old man replied, nodding to the garage beyond them. “I’ll even let you go get your shit out of that garage if you stop running your goddamn mouth.”

Frank studied the man’s face for a moment. He had stitches running from his temple to his jawline, and unlike the scraggy ones Frank had in his side, these ones were nearly perfect sutures. His eyes were puffy and drooped in the corners from his age, following the outline of his round face. Surprisingly, he even looked well-fed, belly ballooning out from a tattered denim jacket. His hands even told their own stories; they were large and dotted with callouses, rings of his fingernails cracked and bleeding, coated in a thick film of gunpowder.

After a moment of deliberating, Frank shook his head. “I’m not going anywhere,” he said, keeping his voice an octave lower than usual, a trick he’d learned while interrogating suspects. “I have other business to attend to than to join your band of freedom fighters.”

Nick laughed. The sound was almost unfamiliar. “I like this guy,” he said with an unusually large grin plastered on his face. He was missing a tooth. “I mean, he kind of has an attitude, but I kind of like it.”

“I don’t,” the older man grumbled, refusing to break his stare at Frank. He tightened his grip on his shotgun. “Ain’t got time for smartass kids who want to pretend to be Superman.”

Frank bit down hard on his lower lip to keep from cracking the man’s lower jaw wide open. He observed the woman shift on her hips to showcase her pistol again. He had no escape plan. If he ran, he’d get shot, and even if they didn’t react as quickly as Frank surmised they would, he wouldn’t have enough time to get the door sealed back into place before they came storming into his refuge.

He wasn’t good at negotiating. Most of his interrogations went quickly because the suspect thought he was intimidating, or they were desperate to get a deal from the judge and opened their mouth at the first opportunity. Joe was the smooth talker—he was the one that chatted with suspects as if they were long-lost friends, telling them irrelevant stories about his life, rattling on about mindless details in such a way that he formed a weird bond of trust with them strong enough to squeeze out the information they needed. Frank was patient, but he wasn’t Joe. He’d never be Joe.

_Where are you?_

Frank opened his mouth to say something, hesitated, and closed it again. The woman rolled her eyes impatiently and began tapping her boots on the ground. He was just about to comment about her annoyance when he heard a sickening crack, wood against bone, as the butt of the shotgun came down on the side of his head.

The world slowly squeezed shut.


	2. 0002

When Frank came to again, the back of his head was aflame with pain, quickly joining ranks with the other welts, bruises and cuts that cover his body. For a moment, he questioned why he’d even decided to leave quarantine in the first place, away from the scratchy, warm blankets of his bed, the warm meals that used to fill his now empty stomach, the sound of his mother’s voice above the shouting of guards and officers. The thought was immediately drowned out by the sound of Joe’s whispers in the middle of the night, the bad jokes that hung in the air like smog, the mess of blonde girls falling short of blue-gray eyes. His mother’s eyes.

Despite the throbbing, Frank tried to examine the room for any sort of clue for where he was being held. He had no idea where the others were. He could hear the sound of voices carrying through the door in front of him, but the entire room was submerged in darkness save for the crack of daylight squeezing through the bottom half of the door.

He was positioned in the middle, seated on a chair, his arms bound with rope behind his back. The room was large, stretching a few feet in every direction, and much like every other building he’d encountered since his escape from quarantine, this one was also covered in dust, the smell of mold wafting from the floorboards. Sawdust floated through the air. To his left, he could barely make out the outlines of machinery, though he couldn’t tell what any of them were or what they did. They blended into the dark corners of the room, looking unused and rusted at best. Whatever this place used to be, it clearly wasn’t in working condition anymore.

Frank switched his focus to the binding on his wrist. He recognized the formation almost immediately: a hunter’s bend, the same one his had father used to tie down his game into place when they’d gone deer hunting in the fall. He didn’t know how to untie himself, especially with his arms behind his back, but he knew the knot consisted of two pieces of rope interlocked in different patterns. How that helped him now, he didn’t know.

He thought about yelling for help, but that thought died in his throat. It was possible there were people waiting outside to kill him, or that they were waiting for him to wake from his unconscious state before forcing him into manual labor. He decided to keep quiet, stretching his wrist so his thumb could graze the coarse, thick rope that bound him to the back of the chair.

Before Frank could think of his next move, the door flung open and sunlight spilled into the room like liquid gold, invading the dark corners. He had been right—this was an old workshop of sorts—but it had been converted into some kind of storage room. Boxes piled up around him up to the ceiling like misshapen skyscrapers, each filled with a different assortment of items—paper, medical supplies, some rusty gears, bottles of spray paint.

A silhouette cut through the light like a knife. Frank recognized him immediately as the younger guy of the trio that had brought him here.

Nick flipped open a pocketknife and began working at the rope around Frank’s wrists. He didn’t miss when Frank’s entire body tensed as the knife drew near to his fingers. “Relax,” Nick said with a chuckle. “Jeez, Ollie really did a number on this knot.”

“I’ll be sure to thank him personally,” Frank snapped, rotating his wrists, now free from their restraints. Nick came back around into view. He had a wide, angular face with big, mud-brown eyes and prickly black stubble that matched his disheveled dark hair that curled around his ears. He wore a dirty flannel with the sleeves bunched up around his forearms, and it didn’t take long for Frank to see the infamous tattoo, the capitalized upside-down A in red ink, marked on Nick’s inner arm. He’d seen it before on Jess’ scrawny wrists when she’d handed him the power bar.

Even though Frank tried his hardest not to look friendly, Nick sighed and began to talk again. “My name’s Nick,” he offered with a smile, but Frank didn’t return it, his mouth in a tight line. “I’m just your average activity plotting my secret vendetta against the all-knowing government.”

Frank’s throat grew tight. “Great,” he said, making sure his sarcasm was heard. Nick screwed up his eyebrows in response. _Mission accomplished_.

“Okay, hey, I can see your disrespect already, man. Just give me a chance,” he said with a shrug.

Frank’s dark eyes floated to the doorway and then back to Nick. He could walk out if he wanted, but he knew that even if he managed to overpower Nick, he would still have to bear the wrath of whatever was waiting for him outside. He rubbed his raw skin on his wrists, feeling the friction burn with his fingers.

Nick looked around the room awkwardly. “My bad about Ollie and Zoë. They’re a little… intense, sometimes.”

Anger began to settle around Frank’s ankles. From his seat, he could still see Nick’s tattoo. “Allegiance, right?” he deadpanned. Nick pulled back, fidgeting with the fabric until his tattoo was half-covered.

“It’s not official headquarters or anything,” Nick said slowly, his expression unchanged. “What do you know about it?”

“I know it’s full of a bunch of radicals who are trying to overthrow the government,” Frank snorted, rising to a power stance. He was going to fight his way out of this one. He’d mentally decided as soon as he saw the tattoo, the symbol of the revolutionists that nearly ransacked an entire quarantine zone and claimed they knew better than army officials. Frank was in danger here. These were the kind of people he’d been trying to avoid ever since he left, and somehow, he’d landed right in their clutches anyway.

He expected Nick to stand too, but he only nudged himself back on the box he was sitting on and cleared the way for Frank to make a quick exit. “What’s the matter? You got a problem with our code of ethics?” he said, giving Frank the once-over. His tone was playful, almost curious.

“Lack thereof, maybe,” Frank grumbled, stretching his sore muscles.

His eyes darted to the doorway as a couple passed with a couple of children following in suit like baby ducklings. He watched them pass, feeling himself well with confusion. Why did they have children here? How could they keep their families so close to the dangers that lurked outside? Allegiance was a shoddy attempt at a governmental rebellion, but they didn’t have even a fourth of the supplies they held in quarantine zones and they definitely didn’t have the means to protect themselves in the same way assault rifles and turrets could protect them. 

“You want to know how to get out?” Nick said suddenly, and Frank was drawn back into the stuffy room with his newfound acquaintance.

Frank said nothing.

“You’re kind of in the heart of the place, but if you turn left and walk straight for a while, you’ll reach the end of the settlement,” Nick said, gesturing in the general direction Frank was supposed to go. “There are scouts stationed at the gates, but they’ll let you pass. Although I gotta say, I’m going to get my ass kicked if you leave.”

Frank sat with the information for a moment. Why was he trying to help? Frank didn’t owe this guy anything—as a matter of fact, Nick owed Frank an apology for knocking him unconscious and taking him back to this place against his will. He hadn’t asked to come here, after all. The only thing Frank was trying to do was find Joe, and he’d accidentally stumbled on them by accident. Wrong place at the wrong time. An unfortunate meet-cute without the happy ending. So why did he feel guilty for leaving? Surely the others wouldn’t punish him for letting Frank go. He could lie and say he got double-crossed, or that Frank had disappeared in the early hours of the morning before Nick even got there. He seriously doubted the others would be that surprised, given their blatant lack of confidence in him.

Frank cast another glance at Nick, turning the situation over in his head. He hated that he felt this way. He didn’t even recognize the sound of his own voice when he opened his mouth and said, “That Ollie guy… what’s his story?”

Nick almost smiled. “He’s from Canada, I think. No idea how he got here, though. Used to run some ranch for some money-hungry conservative,” he said, pulling a lump of fabric from the inside of his flannel. “He’s got a daughter, too. Wild little thing. Total spitfire just like him. She’s about ten or so.”

 _A daughter?_ Frank thought back to the couple with the children he’d seen earlier. “Really?”

Nick nodded. “Yeah. I thought the same thing,” he said, clearly unfazed by Frank’s bewildered expression. “He probably should’ve stayed up there in Alberta, but the government flanked upwards and pushed all the residents into quarantine. Said it was for ‘better protection’ or some bullshit like that.”

Nick tossed the fabric to Frank, and when he unfolded it, he realized it was a plain white t-shirt, probably to replace the grungy one he was wearing. He was soaked in sweat and blood where his bandages had leaked, and he desperately needed a shower, but this would do for now. He yanked the shirt over his head.

“You don’t buy it?” he asked.

“Absolutely fucking not,” Nick said, now leaning against the wall. He’d put some space between him and Frank, and even though Frank didn’t feel an active threat, he was grateful for the room. “Open your eyes, man. They’re using this as an opportunity to seize power against the common man. I’ve been they’ve been planning this outbreak for months. Maybe even years.”

Frank rolled his eyes.

Nick continued. “You don’t honestly believe this all just randomly happened by chance, do you? That all of a sudden this horrible, life-altering virus just ‘got out’?”

Frank looked down at his mud-stained shoes. If he were being honest, he’d tell Nick he didn’t know. He didn’t know much about the contagion until two burly governmental officials dressed in soldier’s gear showed up at his front door and hauled his ass out onto the front lawn without an explanation. Once he and the rest of his family had been cleared, they were tossed into the back of a white van and taken to Quarantine NY, where they were to stay until the situation was resolved. It was nearly a year since they’d been taken, and no one had offered any more information beyond that they were forbidden from leaving quarantine until the vaccine was available.

It never came. Day after day, officials talked about how it was just on the horizon, they were waiting for the shipment, something had happened in Quarantine MC that delayed the process, excuse after excuse until finally Frank decided they weren’t getting a vaccine. Now, feeling Nick’s skepticism flood the room like an unforgiving sea, he wondered if there even was a vaccine to begin with, or if the entire thing had just been a fabricated story to keep everyone quiet.

Still, he’d done what he was told just like everyone else. He savored his ration cards like he was supposed to, kept his head down, worked quietly during his entire shift, and didn’t ask any questions. He barely even said two words to another human being until he came back into his bunk room and found Joe sitting cross-legged on his own bed, thumbing through a book he’d found stashed away somewhere. Frank didn’t like the idea of staying in quarantine for the rest of his life, but he was safe here, his family was safe here, and that’s all he could ask for. Frank had never even thought about leaving until Joe was taken. After that, everything changed.

Nick broke the silence again. “I don’t know, man. All I know is that something doesn’t add up. They got people mangling around in quarantine zones, locked away from the rest of the world, fighting for food and shelter and basic fucking necessities like they’re kind of human zoo while they get to watch,” he said, irritation flaring in his voice. “At least we’re doing something about it here. We’re not just getting into the proverbial fetus position and letting them walk all over us."

Frank didn’t bother asking who Nick was referring to when he said ‘ _them_ ’ and ‘ _they’_. Nick was an avid theorist, and Frank didn’t care to hear about any other conspiracies tucked away in his brain.

“They’re in every bit of danger as we are,” Frank muttered, his eyes landing on a box of old newspapers. Most of them were faded, and the one on top had a giant water stain running through the article, but Frank could make out the headline: _Virus spreads to Midwestern Region: All Residents Urged to Take Shelter!_

The two fell silent. Frank thought of the day he was taken again, the soldiers in their ironclad uniforms, gas masks obtruding their unremarkable faces. They’d grabbed him and Joe before anyone could utter a single cry for help and threw them facedown into the dirt. It wasn’t long before Frank saw his mother suffer the same treatment. She had been folding laundry upstairs and her hands were sticky with laundry detergent. The soldiers pressed some scanning gun up to the back of their necks and then loaded them into the van without a second thought. They were joined, slowly, by other families of their neighborhood, each one confused and shivering with fear.

Hours later they had arrived in their respected quarantine zone, and each family was ripped out of the van and shoved into a vacant room and told to be quiet. Frank had sat with his mother, rubbing her arms and keeping her still while Joe paced back and forth, running his hands through his dark blonde hair over and over until Frank was certain he would pull every tendril out individually. After a couple of long, uncomfortable hours, the door to the room opened and another group poured in, though this time Frank could find his father’s dark hair amid the crowd. He looked like a ghost, unrecognizable almost, but Frank had only been relieved that they were all together.

“You okay?” Nick was saying.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Frank lied, feeling tense from the memory. He whisked it away almost as easily as it had come to him. “Where are the others?”

“No idea,” he replied. “I’m sure they’re around somewhere.”

“They’re not coming for me?”

Nick shook his head. “No. I mean—not now, anyway. Ollie said he was going to check on you this afternoon to see if you’d woken up yet.”

“What does he want?” Frank said, stopping short before completing the full thought: _what does he want with_ me _?_

“I don’t know, actually,” replied Nick. “Ollie isn’t that big on taking hostages. Or, at least, I’ve never seen him do that before. I was told to bring you here and tie you up, but that was about it.”

“Seems like he’s also not keen on showing all his cards,” Frank said.

“You’d be a shitty poker player,” Ollie said, coming through the doorway. He seemed taller than he did the night before, but his demeanor was still the same. “You know the secret to poker, kid?”

“Knowing how to bluff,” Frank said, setting his jaw. He could feel the muscles in his body begin to harden.

Ollie guffawed. “Knowing when it’s time to fold,” he said, spitting on the ground. “Lying ain’t got nothing to do with it.”

Frank squared his shoulder with Ollie’s, their faces separated by nearly a foot of space. “I’m not bluffing when I say I need to get the hell out of here,” Frank said.

Ollie barked out a laugh again, but this time it sounded deeper, less friendly. “You better watch it,” he said with a growl, but Frank didn’t back down. He started vehemently into the old rancher’s eyes, brows furrowed, not willing to forego his pride for even a second. The guilt he felt for Nick moments ago had vanished, and a dark, ugly feeling had filled in its wake. He felt it creeping up the back of his throat, almost as if it would swallow them both whole if he dared to open his mouth again.

A much tinier voice cut through the tension. “Dad?”

Ollie broke his glare first, whipping around toward the door to see a petite, young girl standing in the doorway, shivering slightly from the September cold snap. She had dark red hair peeking out of the hood of her pink jacket, and her cheeks were plum and reddened from the wind. She looked up at Ollie in confusion, her eyes almost as wide as dinner plates.

“Freddie,” Ollie said, his voice taking on a more nurturing, paternal tone. “I told you to stay with Zoë until I got back. You know it’s not safe to be out wandering by yourself.”

“I’m fine,” Freddie said, stuffing her hands into her coat pockets. “She’s no fun anyway. Wouldn’t even let me help polish her knife even though it was already as sharp as a pin needle.”

Ollie sighed. He stepped down from Frank and shot a loaded glance in Nick’s direction before accompanying his daughter at the door. “I’m almost done here. It’s almost mealtime anyway. You find Zoë and I’ll be back in a couple of minutes, okay?”

Freddie look passed her father’s round figure and gave Frank a long stare, pausing just for a moment on his face. She looked as if she was about to say something, but instead, she gave Ollie another inquisitive glance.

“This ain’t none of your business,” Ollie said, moving to stand in between Frank and Freddie. When his daughter responded with an annoyed frown, he added, “You got your knife?”

She pulled out a stubby, rusted pocketknife from her pocket and turned it over in her small hands. He closed his hands over the rusted metal and pushed it back toward her, and she returned it to her pocket. Frank could feel his heart in his stomach. He’d had an air rifle as a kid—he and Joe both did—and they spent their summers darting in and out of the trees, hitting each other with soft pellets, but nothing compared to seeing someone that young with a pocketknife and knowing it was for protection, not just for playing pretend.

“And what did I tell you ‘bout when to use it?” Ollie asked Freddie.

“If it clicks, it sticks.”

“That’s my girl,” he said, drawing her near for a moment. She lingered close to him for a fracture of a second and then darted off once more. Frank lost sight of her in another wave of people crossing by the workshop, the noise increasing in volume and slowly ebbing away to a normal hum of chatter again.

Once Freddie was out of earshot, Ollie turned back toward Frank and Nick, his frustration clear as day on his worn face. He spoke directly to Frank. “You got two options. Option one, you come with me and we make a little deal,” he began. Frank kept his expression neutral. “Option two, you get buried underneath the mulch to make the vegetables grow. Your choice. You got ten seconds to make a decision.”

Frank hesitated for a moment, trying to sense the severity of the threat.

Ollie didn’t falter. “Five seconds.”

“Let’s make a deal then,” Frank found himself saying.

\---

Ollie led them out of the workshop into the daylight and for once, Frank could see the entire face of the compound. They were at the south edge of the settlement, bordered by large buildings used as bunkhouses to shelter the families living on the property. As they walked, Nick explained that Allegiance took over the abandoned farmland because of its spacious fields allowing for better protection, as the scouts positioned on the towers could see things coming from all directions, especially from the thicket due north. Beyond the buildings, a six-foot-tall wire fence bordered the entire perimeter, keeping intruders and infected from penetrating the camp. Frank wondered for a moment how ironic it was that the fence used to be a way to keep livestock from wandering off and now it was used to keep creatures from coming inside.

They made their way inside an old house that had been decorated to look like an old-fashioned log cabin, but now it looked decayed and out of place amid the other buildings. The inside was just as unremarkable, down to the cobwebs stretching from floor to ceiling and the dirty windowpanes. The only thing that seemed to work in the entire cabin was the old fireplace.

A group of people were gathered around a small table in the back, underneath the lofted second floor, but they didn't seem interested in Frank or any of the others. Ollie stoked the fire then took a seat on the armchair on the far-right side of the room. The leather was worn and faded. He motioned for the others to follow suit, and Nick didn't waste any time before sprawling out on the couch that faced the fire.

Frank took a seat on the floor closest to the fire. He liked the way the flames warmed his skin, a nice reprise after the cold nights he’d spent shivering in the back of a truck.

Freddie broke through the little group seated around the table in the back and sat cross-legged on the floor next to Frank, surprisingly close, and he gave her a weak smile. Frank wasn’t naturally intimidating, or at least he didn’t think he was, but he never fared well with young children. They always seemed to keep their distance from him, as if they were unsure if he were friend or foe. Joe, on the other hand, had always been good with kids and had no problem switching from being a serious agent to a goofy, lanky comedian that did impressions in funny voices.

 _That’s because he still is a kid_ , Frank thought to himself, and then added, _Jesus Christ, I’m beginning to sound like Dad._

Zoë appeared suddenly from the loft above them, taking the steps so gracefully it looked like she was floating. She rolled her eyes at Nick’s awkward body thrown over the length of the couch, but kept her mouth shut, choosing instead to sit on a folding chair.

“So, about this deal,” Frank said suddenly, unsure if he was supposed to speak first.

Ollie cleared his throat in warning and leaned back into his chair.

“This is ridiculous,” Zoë said suddenly, crossing her arms tight over her chest. “Why in the hell are we making deals with strangers?”

“He’s not a stranger,” Nick offered from the couch, tucking a pillow behind his head. “At least not anymore.”

Zoë didn’t look impressed. “How do we know we can trust him?”

“I’m alone,” Frank said, watching the fire crackle. “It’s just me.”

“So, what were you doing holed up in the suburbs, then? Painting the deck?”

“I could ask you the same question,” Frank said with a growl, feeling his heart pick up in rhythm. Zoë snorted in protest. “What, so only Allegiance members are allowed to go outside for an evening stroll, and everyone else is immediately a threat?”

Zoë narrowed her eyes. “Yep.”

“Sounds like a double standard to me,” Frank spat, feeling his teeth grind together. Nick sat upright on the couch, obviously jarred from the sudden tension. Frank decided to take another jab. “Don’t worry, I don’t want to join your little _crew_.”

“We’re not recruiting,” Ollie growled, leaning forward to put his hands on his knees. “Explain your business here.”

“I don’t have to tell you shit—”

Ollie was on his feet in seconds. “I didn’t ask for your opinion on the matter.”

Nick raised his arms up. “I feel as though this has gotten a little out of hand.”

“Open your big fucking mouth again and you’ll _lose_ a hand, Falcone,” Zoe mumbled from the corner, keeping her gaze locked on Frank. Nick sank deeper into the couch again, returning to his unusual cone of silence.

“I got separated from my family in quarantine,” Frank said finally. “I’m trying to find them, that’s all.”

Zoë nearly fell over. Frank could see the flames dancing in her honey-gold irises. “You’re kidding,” she said with an exasperated sigh. “You actually _want_ to go to quarantine?”

To Frank’s surprise, Nick sat up again. “He’s not really… down with the idea, Zoë, if you know what I mean.”

“My brother was taken by the guards,” Frank continued, ignoring Nick’s comment. He pretended he was speaking only to Ollie. “I don’t know where he is, but I intend to find him.”

“Why would the guards take him?” Freddie asked quietly, and Frank turned his head to look at her, unsure of what to say. Her big eyes glowed in the light of the fire, and despite her tough outer shell, she looked like she was ready to burst into tears.

“Because people like that think they know what’s best for everybody,” Ollie said behind him. “They don’t stop to think if what they’re doing is actually the right thing or just something they’re told to do.”

Freddie nodded in understanding.

“Seems pretty unreasonable to think he’s even alive,” Zoë said, examining the dirt in her fingernails. “The guards in quarantine zones off people for looking at them the wrong way. He’s a goner.”

Frank kept his face still despite the fact that he was internally battling his worst fear, his baby brother locked away in a cell, blue eyes devoid of life, pale body limp from exhaustion and starvation. He shook his head to clear the thought, but it was always there, ever-present, lurking in the back of his mind, plaguing his dreams with nightmares about Joe’s throat getting slit or his head bashed in or a gunshot to the back of the skull. The thought never went away completely, just went dormant, waiting for the right moment to creep into the discouraged mind and send Frank over the edge. He suddenly felt sick.

“It’s none of anyone’s business,” he said, finding his voice. “Just tell me what I need to do so I can get the hell out of here.”

Ollie cleared his throat again, preparing to offer Frank the deal of a lifetime, but neither party was really that excited about it. “A bunch of damn prowlers have staked out the old convenience store just down the street,” he said, stretching his long legs. He spat into the fire and watched the logs sizzle. “We have a lot of women and children here. Good people. Families. The closer they get to the compound the closer they get to taking over the place completely.”

“Prowlers?” asked Frank.

“Piece-o’-shit cowards,” Ollie explained. “I’d bet nearly all of our problems are from them, not the infected. They’re always trying to find a way to sneak in and steal all our shit.”

“How many are there?”

“No idea.”

“What’s the job?”

“You and a few of my men are gonna go down there and stake out the place. Watch their movements, see what they’ve done to the place,” Ollie said. “When the time is right, you go in and clear out the place.”

Frank blinked in disbelief. “You want me to go unarmed and take out an entire band of people without knowing how many there are or what they’re packing? You can’t be serious.”

“I said I ain’t sending you alone,” Ollie barked. “You’d be dog food in seconds.”

“You’re still asking for mass murder, you know.”

Zoe laughed angrily, the noise sharp and unforgiving. “We’ve been in this hellhole for nearly a year now, if not longer. If you haven’t killed anyone yet, you’re in for a _big_ fucking surprise.”

Frank grimaced in response. He’d shot a lot of people during his time working at the Network—in the leg, in the shoulder, in the knee, maybe—but it was only to keep them incapacitated before backup could arrive. He’d never given the final blow, never watched the life drain out of someone’s eyes, never seen a body grow cold from his own bullet. But he wasn’t about to tell any of them yet, not when they were trusting him with such a big operation. As soon as he was outside the compound, he would take off for the thicket and put as much distance between himself and this godforsaken place as he could.

“Doesn’t seem like the kind of thing in his moral code,” Nick offered, scratching his stubble. “That’s okay, though. Violence isn’t always the answer.”

“This coming from the idiot who strapped himself to demolition equipment to save a rotting theater.” Zoë snapped. “Don’t give me that activist shit, Nick. Not now.”

Ollie held up a hand to cease the bickering. “Listen, kid—”

“Don’t call me kid,” Frank interjected.

Ollie looked like he was about to catch fire from Frank’s sudden interruption, but he merely cleared his throat again and said, “I didn’t say you had to kill anyone, but makin’ a deal with them folk ain’t gonna come easy. They ain’t the talkin’ type,”

Frank nodded sarcastically. “They won’t listen and they won’t go down without a fight. Is that what you’re saying?”

Ollie rose to dump a tiny pail of water onto the fire, watching it melt into a smokey haze. “I’m sayin’ it won’t be easy, kid. That’s all.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks to everyone who has read/left kudos! i appreciate you all <3


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